Page 18 of His Orc Lady

I grab a bar of soap and lather up my hands, even though I’ve washed myself already. It won’t hurt if I stay here just a little longer. After all, it’s not even time for breakfast yet, so I can take a minute to talk.

“In the old palace, we didn’t have hot water,” I tell Owen. “We had a communal bathing space with fires always burning under big copper tubs, but the water was never as fresh.”

He leans his head on the lip of the pool and stares at the ceiling, his mouth upturned in a smile. “Ah. Especially lovely when a whole battalion of soldiers comes back from a campaign and they stink up the place, huh?”

I laugh at the image. “You seem to have experience with that.”

Owen sends me a sideways glance. “I joined the Army at fifteen. I’ve had to work my way up the ranks and spent a decade being a common foot soldier before they transferred me to the city watch.”

I’ve stopped pretending that I’m washing, so I lift the slightly softened soap from the water and deposit it in a dish. “At fifteen?That’s awfully young. Our children train, but they can’t join the ranks of the warriors until they’re nineteen years old.”

“Oh, our Army doesn’t accept children either. I told them I was eighteen when I signed up.” He takes the soap I set aside and scrubs his arms with it, then adds, “I think they knew I was lying, but I was tall for my age and didn’t mind scrubbing out the floors or tending to the barracks if it meant I got to eat well three times a day.”

Something moves in my chest at his words. Did he grow up poor? Or was he an orphan? I want to ask him all of it, but I don’t know how to put the questions delicately, without insulting him or his family. I’ve always had enough to eat, even in the old kingdom.

“I didn’t tell you this so you could pity me.” Owen’s voice is quiet, and he looks right at me, his chin raised proudly. “I’m lucky to have a family who loves me, but my parents had four other children, all younger than me, and I saw the strain on our family’s finances once my father had to retire from work because of his bad back.” He shrugs and goes back to washing himself. “I was never much good with letters or numbers, and the Army sounded like a lot of fun. Several of us boys from our neighborhood joined the ranks that year.”

I study his expression closely, noting the frown line between his eyebrows, the muscle jumping in his jaw.

“How many of those friends made it to adulthood?”

He snaps his head up, his gaze sharp. “Two,” he rasps. “Only two.”

“I’m sorry.”

I want to reach out and touch his arm, to wrap him in an embrace and comfort him—but we’re in separate pools, both naked, and most of all, still mostly strangers. He said he didn’t want my pity earlier, and I don’t think he wants it now.

We’re not so different, after all.

Owen nods, then takes a deep breath and submerges himself, disappearing underwater. In a few seconds, he rises again, his blond hair darkened and slicked back from his face, accentuating his high cheekbones and the square cut of his jaw.

He’s magnificent, his shoulders rounded with muscle, his chest sculpted and hard, scattered with more golden hair.

He scrubs his hands over his face—and catches me staring.

I can’t look away. His form isn’t all that different from any other man I’ve ever seen, though his skin is pale and pinkened from the heat of the water. But I’ve never been this fascinated with anyone before.

For long moments, Owen stares right back at me, his gaze going from my hair to my face and down to where I’m hidden by the reflective surface of the pool. If I stood, he’d see my upper body, too, because I’m not much shorter than him—and I wonder if that bothers him, if he prefers shorter women, maybe, ones shaped like Poppy or Jasmine or Dawn.

But it’s not them he’s watching, and from the intensity of his gaze, I don’t think he minds my form at all, nor my green skin.

The tension between us tightens. I squeeze my hands into fists to keep myself from climbing out of my pool and straight into his. I want to feel his warm skin under my palms, to touch those scars he hides beneath his tunic. I want to be the only one who counts all those tiny moles on his skin, constellations of brown dots.

He moves first, picking up the soap again and bringing it up to his nose to sniff. “Is this the soap you use?”

I frown. He just saw me put it there—so why is he…?

Oh.

I told him I use strawberry-scented soap to cover up the fact that he seems to scent my natural essence, the same as an orc would.

He’s staring at me with narrowed eyes, and when I don’t reply, he puts the soap down and rinses his hands. “Smells nothing like strawberries.”

I don’t have the will to lie to him anymore, but he still hasn’t indicated that he wants anything more from me than staring at me from afar. Unless he acts first and tells me he wants me for me, not because he feels obligated to remain here, I won’t say anything.

Owen stands, water sluicing down his hard body, and reaches for the bathing sheet he’d left by the pool earlier.

My runaway thoughts grind to an abrupt halt. “Are you leaving?”

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